


Impossible

by starstruck1986



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-21
Updated: 2014-09-21
Packaged: 2018-02-18 07:09:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,377
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2339615
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/starstruck1986/pseuds/starstruck1986
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The beach swamps him in memories, but he can face it because of the impossible man he loves.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Impossible

**Author's Note:**

  * For [kittylefish](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=kittylefish).



**Warnings / Content:** Fluff, angst, swearing, mentioned canon character deaths (and story is mostly canon compliant.)  
 **Prompt:** _It's too darn hot! summer is over, or should be, yet there is a ridiculous heat wave._  
  
  
Remus paused in washing up to wipe his forehead with the back of his hand. Finally, _finally_ , the heat of the day seemed to be sizzling out. A September heatwave, they'd said. Severus had laughed long and hard at the prediction.  
  
Smirking to himself, as he usually did when his dearest was proved wrong, Remus picked up another plate and began to wash it. His outlook over the garden gave him a lovely view of the sky, riddled with pinks and lilacs in the wake of the setting sun. A cool draft tickled his damp skin and he tipped his head back, eyes closed, to enjoy it. The house was silent. Wherever Severus was sulking after their crossed words, he was doing it quietly. That made a difference to the usual slamming doors and stomping.  
  
He smiled to himself again, knowing that he partook in his fair share of door slamming and petulant stamping too.  
  
“What're you so happy about?”  
  
Severus made him jump and the plate landed in the sink with a clatter, sending bubbles up over Remus' upper half. He didn't bother to answer; Severus passed him and stood in the back doorway, turning his own face up to the cooling air and the pretty view.  
  
The soft pastels in the sky were mirrored in the sea beyond the end of their garden. Remus found himself smiling once more and picked up the plate again. Severus stood in the doorway, thin but tall, wiry but, as Remus loved him, vulnerable. The war had left permanent damage on many of them, but Severus more than most. Remus finally slotted the plate to safety on the draining board and reached for a tea towel to dry his hands. Severus remained still as Remus tipped the water away and hung up the towel. Even as Remus stepped up behind him and touched his hands to Severus' waist, the wizard stayed still and offered no acknowledgement.  
  
Full-on grinning by that point, Remus cuddled into the back of his lover, wrapping his arms tightly around Severus' chest. He pressed a kiss into the side of his neck and kept his mouth close by thereafter. He looked up and followed Severus' line of sight – far out to sea. One of the buoys was flashing, bobbing up and down gently in calm water. Finally the shrieks and cries of joy from the beach had died out. As usual when the sun shone, human beings had crept out of every available crevice to soak up the unexpected sunshine on their beach. It was another thing that had contributed to Severus' bad mood.  
  
“How about we go for a walk, hmm?” Remus whispered, sneaking one hand into the open collar of Severus' shirt.  
  
They'd been living together for years, but Remus wasn't sure he would ever get used to the sight of the stiff, unyielding Potions Master in casual clothes. Even when they'd been at school Remus couldn't recall seeing him in anything other than robes. Knowing what he now knew, however, that was probably because Severus was too embarrassed to wear anything _but_ his robes at Hogwarts.  
  
 _James and Sirius made fun of him enough without that._  
  
As it always did, guilt slashed through his gut at the memories of just what he had let slide at school in the name of friendship.  
  
He was surprised as Severus stepped forward, dislodging his hands, and then reached back for one. The grip on contact was warm and tight. Remus pulled the back door closed behind him. The wards sealed immediately. Not that it mattered. Bad things never happened in their quiet little part of the world.  
  
Barefoot and lightly dressed given the heat of the day, Remus enjoyed the cooled grass under his feet as they crossed the garden, and then the cooling sand after they'd passed through the gate at the end onto the beach. As he'd guessed, it was now deserted, but the remnants of the day's visitors were everywhere – impressive sandcastles complete with moats, leftover inflatables and the odd bit of rubbish. Without commenting, he used his wand to bin the rubbish and hook the leftovers over the fences. The sandcastles he left; they reminded him of his youth and happy warm days on the beach with his parents, before his bite. Some after, too, but there was never again the same innocence, the same carefree joy. Remus swallowed away a lump in his throat and instead looked at Severus – his present, rather than his past.  
  
The past would never leave him alone, what with its violent and painful visit each month, but there was so much good in between, these days, that it didn't do to dwell on what had gone before. There had been good there, too... but much of it had been wrenched from him and he had been hurt, so many times. His soulmate, taken from him twice. A wife, stolen from him by war. A son, locked under the protection of his grandmother, who, no matter what was said or done, would always loathe Remus for the death of her daughter. The man walking next to him was simply all Remus had, but in many aspects he had never felt richer.  
  
He squeezed the hand he held and huddled in close to Severus' body.  
  
“I don't know why you do it to yourself,” Severus muttered. The beach was so still that Remus caught every word of a sentence Severus had probably hoped would go unnoticed.  
“Do what?” Remus asked, taking the bait.  
“Come down here. Insist on living next to it. When all it does is throw memories up in your face and make you sad.”  
“It doesn't always...” Remus looked down at his feet.  
“Only mostly.” Severus sighed, dropped his hand and instead put his arm around Remus' shoulders.  
“Does this mean you've stopped sulking?” Remus asked airily.  
“It's too fucking hot!” Severus snapped loudly. His rebuke echoed across the beach.  
“You've got goosebumps,” Remus pointed out, eyeing Severus' neck.  
“That's because it's been so bloody hot I'm now cold.”  
“You're impossible.”  
“Thank you.”  
  
Remus laughed, and it was his turn for the sound to bounce back off the rocks on the other side of the bay.  
  
“It wasn't a compliment,” he said finally, shaking his head.  
  
Severus made a dismissive sound in his throat and, in a move which Remus knew would never happen if they were not entirely alone, stopped dead and pulled him into an embrace. Remus took the kiss as it came – slow, wet and gentle. He smoothed his hands up and down Severus' back, trying to entice a groan out of him. When there was no response, he instead put his fingers into dark hair and curled strands around them. He tugged. That worked.  
  
“Bastard,” Severus murmured against his lips. “Be good. Else I'll have you here and now.”  
“And get done for indecent exposure?” Remus actually snorted in disbelief. “I'll believe that when I see it.”  
“You underestimate my control.”  
“I underestimate nothing about you, Severus.”  
  
Severus pulled back and looked at him questioningly. Having spoken without really thinking, forgetting whom he was speaking to, Remus sought a way out of the sticky patch.  
  
“I love you,” he offered, and rested his forehead against Severus'.  
  
Severus held his gaze for a few moments more and, for whatever reason, decided to let it go. They kissed again, seemingly growing ever-closer, and Remus tried to absorb the moment fully. The closeness of Severus and his scent of herbs and tea, the salty tang of the air coming in off the sea. He had to be imagining the whiff of sun-cream. Beach smells.  
  
He was so lost in it, when Severus pulled away he was left standing with his eyes closed and his lips puckered like a fool. When he looked, Severus was strolling away from him in the direction of the house. The wind picked up his hair and made it dance a little in the breeze. Remus swallowed another lump away in his throat and followed.  
  
 _-fin-_


End file.
